1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to techniques for detecting a travel condition of a vehicle other than the subject vehicle.
2. Related Art
Techniques are known for acquiring position information of a vehicle other than the subject vehicle through vehicle-to-vehicle communication and utilizing the position information of the other vehicle to detect a relative position of the other vehicle relative to the subject vehicle. As an example, the technique as disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Publication No. 2007-280060 evaluates a degree of matching between a radar vector representing the amount and direction of the other vehicle detected by the radar and a GPS vector representing the amount and direction of the other vehicle determined based on of the position information of the other vehicle received through the vehicle-to-vehicle communication. When the degree of matching is equal to or greater than a threshold, it is determined that the vehicle having the radar vector is a vehicle with which the subject vehicle is communicating.
However, great errors may be present in the GPS location information, which can lead to great errors in the amount and direction of movement determined on the basis of the location information. Therefore, for example, in situations such that a plurality of vehicles other than the subject vehicle are traveling in the same direction in proximity to each other, it is difficult to determine associations between the plurality of other vehicles detected by the detector (e.g., the radar or the like) mounted in the subject vehicle and the plurality of other vehicles with which the subject vehicle is communicating in vehicle-to-vehicle communication.
In consideration of the foregoing, it would therefore be desirable to have techniques for accurately determining an association between a vehicle detected by a detector mounted in the subject vehicle and a vehicle with which the subject vehicle is communicating in vehicle-to-vehicle communication.